As Edward Snowden Is Hunted, Wikileaks Founder Praises His ‘Service To Humanity’

UPDATES ON THE NSA SCANDAL

Kin Cheung/AP

As Edward Snowden Is Hunted, Wikileaks Founder Praises His ‘Service To Humanity’

By Elizabeth Coady

WIKILEAKS FOUNDER JULIAN ASSANGE RELEASED A STATEMENT TODAY calling on the world’s people to “Step forward and stand with Snowden” a day after charges were announced against the NSA whistleblower.

“The US government is spying on each and every one of us, but it is Edward Snowden who is charged with espionage for tipping us off,” Assange said in an impassioned letter to the public praising Snowden as well as Bradley Manning, now on trial for “aiding the enemy. “It is getting to the point where the mark of international distinction and service to humanity is no longer the Nobel Peace Prize, but an espionage indictment from the US Department of Justice.”
“The word “traitor” has been thrown around a lot in recent days,” he continued. “But who is really the traitor here? Who was it who promised a generation “hope” and “change,” only to betray those promises with dismal misery and stagnation? Who took an oath to defend the US constitution, only to feed the invisible beast of secret law devouring it alive from the inside out?”

Assange’s statement comes exactly one year after he entered the Ecuadorian embassy in London to avoid extradition to Sweden for questioning on sex charges. Assange says he sought protection inside the embassy out of fear that Sweden would remand him to the U.S. where it’s believed the government has a sealed indictment for his arrest.

Snowden, who turned 30 yesterday, is charged with Snowden with theft of U.S. government property, unauthorized communication of national defense information and willful communication of classified communications intelligence to an unauthorized person, according to the Washington Post. Experts say that legal wrangling could take years before Snowden is extradited, and that Hong Kong officials could grant him political asylum. The New York Times“reports today that Snowden is “staying in an apartment in Hong Kong’s Western neighborhood that is controlled by the Hong Kong government’s security branch.”

Assange, deemed a political enemy of the United States for releasing damning documents about the U.S. that were uploaded to WikiLeaks by Manning, is but only voice speaking out about the U.S. government’s abuse of surveillance.

Speaking at a business luncheon in Scotland, Former President Bill Clinton said the government’s surveillance state and FISA court was “blurry, grey and made people uncomfortable.”

“I believe the most important thing is that we have accountability, he told the audience at the Scottish Business Awards. “But I will say this – freedom and security are not incompatible; they’re mutually reinforcing.

“I think you’re more secure if you have more freedom. Therefore I think we should be on guard for abuses of the use of technology by our government….You can destroy freedom with false claims that you have to do it to make everybody secure, but usually when somebody’s doing it, they don’t give a rip about security, they’re just trying to get more power.

“And so the key here is accountability, transparency and protection against use of information, inadvertently found, for other purposes.”

Here is Julian Assange’s full statement on Snowden:

It has now been a year since I entered this embassy and sought refuge from persecution.

As a result of that decision, I have been able to work in relative safety from a US espionage investigation.

But today, Edward Snowden’s ordeal is just beginning.

Two dangerous runaway processes have taken root in the last decade, with fatal consequences for democracy.

Government secrecy has been expanding on a terrific scale.

Simultaneously, human privacy has been secretly eradicated.

A few weeks ago, Edward Snowden blew the whistle on an ongoing program – involving the Obama administration, the intelligence community and the internet services giants – to spy on everyone in the world.

As if by clockwork, he has been charged with espionage by the Obama administration.

The US government is spying on each and every one of us, but it is Edward Snowden who is charged with espionage for tipping us off.

It is getting to the point where the mark of international distinction and service to humanity is no longer the Nobel Peace Prize, but an espionage indictment from the US Department of Justice.

Edward Snowden is the eighth leaker to be charged with espionage under this president.

Bradley Manning’s show trial enters its fourth week on Monday.

After a litany of wrongs done to him, the US government is trying to convict him of “aiding the enemy.”

The word “traitor” has been thrown around a lot in recent days.

But who is really the traitor here?

Who was it who promised a generation “hope” and “change,” only to betray those promises with dismal misery and stagnation?

Who took an oath to defend the US constitution, only to feed the invisible beast of secret law devouring it alive from the inside out?

Who is it that promised to preside over The Most Transparent Administration in history, only to crush whistleblower after whistleblower with the bootheel of espionage charges?

Who combined in his executive the powers of judge, jury and executioner, and claimed the jurisdiction of the entire earth on which to exercise those powers?

Who arrogates the power to spy on the entire earth – every single one of us – and when he is caught red handed, explains to us that “we’re going to have to make a choice.”

Who is that person?

Let’s be very careful about who we call “traitor”.

Edward Snowden is one of us.

Bradley Manning is one of us.

They are young, technically minded people from the generation that Barack Obama betrayed.

They are the generation that grew up on the internet, and were shaped by it.

The US government is always going to need intelligence analysts and systems administrators, and they are going to have to hire them from this generation and the ones that follow it.

One day, their generation will run the NSA, the CIA and the FBI.

This isn’t a phenomenon that is going away.

This is inevitable.

And by trying to crush these young whistleblowers with espionage charges, the US government is taking on a generation, and that is a battle it is going to lose.

This isn’t how to fix things.

The only way to fix things is this:

Change the policies.

Stop spying on the world.

Eradicate secret law.

Cease indefinite detention without trial.

Stop assassinating people.

Stop invading other countries and sending young Americans off to kill and be killed.

3 Comments

I love what’s Snowden is doing, but I hope he doesn’t end up like Julian Assange. I was in London last December and stopped by the Ecquadorean embassy he is in. Not one protestor in sight. I went in the building, talked to the man and the cop at the front desk, asked if I could see him, they said “Sure, just knock on that door right there.” I did, and a very large man came to the door. I asked if I could meet him, they said no, and that was that.
Immediately across the street is Harrod’s, one of the biggest shopping places in London, thousands of people shopping there everyday. Not one probably stops by or gives two shits what this guy has done for them. From the cover of Time magazine to living in an embassy with no protestors. What a life.

the irony here is that when the republicans finally get back in the office of the presidency, the government leaks and the leakers will have been already ok’ed (actually honored) by those who hate president obama, leaving the republicans ill equipped to handle terrorist activity. and the bigger irony is that the bush administration along with cheney, started all of these covert activities. the biggest irony is that every company and website any of us does business with is already capturing our information (hardware mac address, ip address, proxy address, cookies, shopping, sites visited, and much much more) with our permission. when is the last time you actually read the policy agreement when installing software. every comment we make on the internet is stored too. and yes, the current administration is carrying on the same business as the republicans did. people change, everything else stays the same.